The Ballad of Little Joe Smith
The Ballad of Little Joe Smith is an episode that tells the story of Joseph Smith. It has a lesson in the fine examples of having fame and fortune. Plot The Countertop Bob and Larry introduce the show normally. No random disturbance by Larry. They go over to QWERTY and he says he got a letter from a kid named Harold. His problem is to face the facts of having fame and fortune. Bob says that's a tricky one, but says he has a story to help the situation. The Story Joseph Smith, Jr. was born on December 23, 1805, in Sharon, Vermont, to Lucy Mack Smith and her husband Joseph, a merchant and farmer. After suffering a crippling bone infection when he was seven, the younger Smith hobbled around on crutches for three years.6 In 1816–17, after an ill-fated business venture and three years of crop failures, the Smith family moved to the western New York village of Palmyra, and eventually took a mortgage on a 100-acre (40 ha) farm in the nearby town of Manchester. During the Second Great Awakening, the region was a hotbed of religious enthusiasm; and between 1817 and 1825, there were several camp meetings and revivals in the Palmyra area.7 Although Smith's parents disagreed about religion, the family was caught up in this excitement.8 Smith later said he became interested in religion at about the age of twelve; without doubt, he participated in church classes and read the Bible. As a teenager, he may have been sympathetic to Methodism.9 With other family members, Smith also engaged in religious folk magic, not an uncommon practice at the time.10 Both his parents and his maternal grandfather reportedly had visions or dreams that they believed communicated messages from God.11 Smith said that although he had become concerned about the welfare of his soul, he was confused by the claims of competing religious denominations.12 Years later Smith said that in 1820 he had received a vision that resolved his religious confusion.13 While praying in a wooded area near his home, he said that God, in a vision, had told him his sins were forgiven and that all contemporary churches had "turned aside from the gospel."14 Smith said he told the experience to a preacher, who dismissed the story with contempt; but the experience was largely unknown, even to most Mormons, until the 1840s.15 Although Smith may have understood the event as a personal conversion, this "First Vision" later grew in importance among Mormons, who today see it as the founding event of Mormonism.16 Smith said he received golden plates from the angel Moroni at the Hill Cumorah. Smith said that in 1823 while praying one night for forgiveness from his sins, he was visited by an angel named Moroni, who revealed the location of a buried book made of golden plates, as well as other artifacts, including a breastplate and a set of interpreters composed of two seer stones set in a frame, which had been hidden in a hill in Manchester near his home.17 Smith said he attempted to remove the plates the next morning but was unsuccessful because the angel prevented him.18 Smith reported that during the next four years, he made annual visits to the hill but each time returned without the plates.19 Meanwhile, the Smith family faced financial hardship due in part to the November 1823 death of Smith's oldest brother Alex, who had assumed a leadership role in the family.20 Family members supplemented their meager farm income by hiring out for odd jobs and working as treasure seekers, a type of magical supernaturalism common during the period.21 Smith was said to have an ability to locate lost items by looking into a seer stone, which he also used in treasure hunting, including several unsuccessful attempts to find buried treasure sponsored by a wealthy farmer in Chenango County, New York.22 In 1826, Smith was brought before a Chenango County court for "glass-looking", or pretending to find lost treasure.23 The result of the proceeding remains unclear as primary sources report various conflicting outcomes.24 While boarding at the Hale house in Harmony, Pennsylvania, Smith began courting Emma Hale. When Smith proposed marriage, Emma's father Isaac Hale objected because Smith was "a stranger" who had no means of supporting his daughter other than money digging, of which he disapproved.25 Smith and Emma eloped and were married on January 18, 1827, after which the couple began boarding with Smith's parents in Manchester. Later that year, when Smith promised to abandon treasure seeking, Hale offered to let the couple live on his property in Harmony and help Smith get started in business. Smith said that he made his last annual visit to the hill on September 22, 1827, taking Emma with him. This time, he said he retrieved the plates and put them in a locked chest. He said the angel commanded him not to show the plates to anyone else but to publish their translation, reputed to be the religious record of indigenous Americans. Although Smith had left his treasure hunting company, his former associates believed he had double-crossed them by taking for himself what they considered joint property. After they ransacked places where a competing treasure-seer said the plates were hidden, Smith decided to leave Palmyra. What We Have Learned Bob, Larry, and Harold liked the story. It was time to talk about what they learned. They got their verse, discussed the moral of the story, and said goodbye. Cast *Larry (Little Joe Smith) *Bob *Petunia (Lucy Mack) *Mr. Lunt (Issac Hale) *Madame Blueberry (Emma) *Archibald (Joseph) *Pa Grape (Alex) *QWERTY *Harold Songs *VeggieTales Theme Song *Little Joe Smith's Origin *Facing Everyday Fears is A Big Struggle *The Waterfall Doo-Wop (Silly Songs with Larry) *The Tough Times of Hard Difficulty *Love Makes You Rich *What We Have Learned Running Gags Silly Song Silly Songs with Larry "The Waterfall Doo-Wop" What We Have Learned song Pioneer Version Kid They Got a Letter From Harold Trivia *This is the third episode where a title of a previous VeggieTales episode is used in the title. The first two being "Twice Upon a Wall: Are You Not My Neighbor?" and "The Star of Christmas and Hanukkah Doesn't Get a Star". *This episode would become the basis of the Book of Mormon Project series. Category:Episodes Category:Fanon Works Category:VeggieFan2000